


These Here Are My Desires

by savvierthanu



Category: The Eagle (2011)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-03-07
Updated: 2011-03-07
Packaged: 2017-10-21 14:49:48
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,677
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/226399
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/savvierthanu/pseuds/savvierthanu
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What should have happened immediately after the movie ended. I.e. porn.</p>
            </blockquote>





	These Here Are My Desires

Marcus feels light as air when he steps out into the weak Calleva sunlight, the weight of the eagle lifted from his shoulders at last. He could laugh—particularly at the looks on the senators’ faces—but the sound dies in his throat when he notices Esca walking away from him, purpose written in the set of his shoulders.

“Where are you going?” he calls, hurrying to catch him, sudden dread that Esca has decided to gather up his freedom and leave seizing him.

“I’ve decided,” Esca says, barely looking over his shoulder.

Marcus sidesteps to avoid a mule, keeping his eyes locked on the back of Esca’s head as he moves through the streets, bobbing around carts and pedestrians towards an unknown destination. Just as Marcus’ leg begins to cramp, Esca stops short in the doorway of a building near the outskirts of the town.

“Esca, there’s paperwork that needs to be drawn up before you—”

“Wait here,” Esca cuts him off, disappearing into the building. With nothing else to do, Marcus stands there, stupidly, trying to get his bearings as he curses Esca’s willfulness and tries to shake the ache out of his leg. Anything to keep him from seriously contemplating exactly what Esca is doing that he doesn’t want Marcus privy to.

Several minutes later, Marcus is just lowering himself onto an empty crate to settle in to wait when Esca reemerges, frowning slightly as he looks around. Marcus whistles two short notes and Esca turns sharply, but his posture relaxes minutely.

“Come on, I’ve gotten us a room.” He jerks towards the doorway with his head.

“What?” Marcus looks around, realizing that Esca must have led him to some sort of inn.

Esca approaches, grasping his elbow and helping him to his feet. “Try to look like you just sent your slave inside to haggle over a meal and a room for the evening.”

“Esca, no, you aren’t—” and Marcus digs in his heels, determined not to move until he has a better idea of what’s going on.

“The fact that you’ve freed me isn’t general knowledge yet. It’ll look better if people think you’ve bought a room to spend some private time with a slave.”

Marcus finds himself dumbstruck and Esca raises a challenging eyebrow, his jaw set determinedly, daring Marcus to disagree. “I’ve already paid,” Esca says, leaving no room for argument.

“Yes, alright,” Marcus stammers, moving to follow Esca into the dimness of the tavern. He’s confused, but there’s curiosity as well. He trusts Esca.

Despite Esca’s comfort with the little tale he’s spun, Marcus makes a point of exaggerating a limp and looking like a man who’s overtaxed himself at the market as they make their way towards the stairs to the guest rooms. As he follows Esca he tries to keep his attention on the back of his head, but as they turn a corner he thinks he can make out a smile playing around Esca’s mouth, likely a result of his foolishness as he pretends to struggle up the stairs.

He hadn’t been looking around much, but when Esca stops and Marcus realizes that there are actual doors rather than curtains separating the rooms from the hallway, a shiver of trepidation runs through him. He dimly wonders what Esca paid, but those thoughts leave him when they enter the room and the door shuts behind them.

Esca stands in the middle of the room looking as defiant as ever—chin lifted, shoulders squared, hands loosely fisted at his sides—and Marcus suddenly realizes that _this_ was the true destination of their journey. Not delivering the eagle—not since they made it south of the wall—and not this room with its smoke-stained walls and worn furniture. No, it was the confrontation of the living, growing thing between them that Marcus struggles to put a name to.

“Esca,” he pleads, not quite knowing precisely what he wants to ask for. All he knows is that he’s finally allowing himself to truly see Esca, to look at him as he would look at anything so beautiful that he could never justify possessing it. It makes him ache, how beautiful Esca is.

“Come here,” Esca says, tension in his clipped words and faint insecurity in his eyes. Marcus stumbles forward to reassure him, if nothing else. But he stops just within arm’s length.

“What do you want, Esca?” Marcus watches Esca shut his eyes and clench his jaw.

When he opens them, the insecurity is gone, replaced with sheer determination. “Touch me.”

Marcus balks, not moving, even though he would like nothing better than to do as Esca asks. For many reasons.

“Please,” Esca whispers.

Before he can think, Marcus cups Esca’s cheek in his broad palm, watching as Esca lets out a long breath through his nose, the muscles in his face relaxing. He brings up his other hand to trace over Esca’s cheekbone, his jaw, the ridge of his brow with reverent fingers. It makes Marcus feel as though he's pawing at something delicate and fine, even though he's seen Esca’s face grimy and covered with several days' stubble. Esca must see his hesitation through heavily lidded eyes, because his lips curl up and Marcus's fingers move instinctively to avoid the knife's edge of his smile.

"Since when does a Roman not simply take what he wants?"

Marcus doesn't have an answer for that, especially not when Esca turns his head to scrape his teeth over the tip of his thumb before pressing the wet heat of his tongue against it briefly. He feels suddenly at ease; this is the Esca he knows.

“This is what you have decided.”

“It is.”

“I don’t wish to do anything you don’t want me to.”

Esca’s eyes actually soften and Marcus’ breath catches. “You won’t.”

Marcus strokes his wet thumb over Esca’s lower lip. “I’d like to kiss you.”

Esca’s teeth glint as he smiles, gripping Marcus’ neck in one hand and his bicep with the other, pulling him in. “So polite,” he murmurs just before their mouths touch.

The kiss turns fierce quickly, for Esca is not gentle. He uses his teeth and his strong fingers to direct Marcus where he wants him, their stubble catching as they move. At one point Marcus catches his teeth on Esca’s lower lip accidentally, and is surprised with a guttural growl as Esca presses even closer. His arousal is apparent when he grinds it into Marcus’ good thigh.

“You paid good money for the room,” Marcus says between kisses to Esca’s jaw, “we might as well make use of the amenities.”

Esca’s answer is to begin undressing, which is as good a reply as Marcus could hope for. Marcus’ tunic is easy enough to be rid of, but he has to sit on the edge of the bed to remove his boots before he can peel off his breeches, distracted all the while as Esca tears off his clothing as though they have offended him.

Marcus is still struggling when Esca finishes, straightening from kicking off his breeches and displaying himself for Marcus’ gaze—all the hard, sparse lines that he remembers from the arena with the addition of his hard cock jutting towards him, the tip already slick.

Esca’s hands are as gentle as they ever were when he reaches over to help ease the cloth over Marcus’ stiff knee and down his calves, but the hand that he lays on Marcus’ chest to push him down onto his back is firm. Marcus lies back obediently, drinking in the sight of Esca straddling him before he leans down for another kiss.

Marcus runs his hands all over Esca’s pale skin, down his back and up his chest, over his thighs and around his cock and balls, teasing through his pubic hair. He should be thinking of the consequences of all this, how sharing a bed and sharing a life are not the same things. How much easier all this would be if Esca were still his slave, not that he would ever wish it upon him. But then Esca is lowering himself down to lie fully on top of Marcus, and the sudden pressure on his cock drives all thoughts from his mind as he sucks on Esca’s mobile tongue and wraps his arms firmly around his ribs.

Esca is proprietary, Marcus discovers, keeping one hand at the base of Marcus’ throat, moving it to his jaw to tilt his head back for better access to his throat, all the while thrusting gently but steadily against Marcus’ hip. It sets a fire burning low in Marcus’ belly, warming him from the inside, out, until their bodies are slipping against each other with sweat and Esca is flushing pink from the tips of his ears to his chest.

“I should be ashamed of the things I want from you,” Marcus says as Esca mouths his way over his stomach, edging ever closer to the ache between his legs.

Esca halts his progress and looks up, his storm-cloud eyes practically sparking with heat. “And why is that?”

Marcus traces his fingers over Esca’s cheeks to stroke into his hair, slicked with sweat at the temples but softer than he could have imagined. “Because I respect you too much to simply use you.”

Smirking, Esca slides up Marcus’ body until they’re nose to nose once more, his hands on either side of Marcus’ head, boxing him in. “And what makes you think I’m not the one using you?” He punctuates his words with a pointed grind of his hips downward, forcing a grunt out of Marcus as their cocks slide together, trapped between their stomachs.

“I know you,” Marcus replies simply, grasping one of Esca’s wrists and using his strength and perhaps more than a little of his wrestling knowledge to pin Esca beneath him. “You couldn’t use me any more than I could use you.”

“Does Roman arrogance know no bounds?” Esca’s mouth settles back into its customary hard line, so Marcus is forced to kiss it back to pliancy. As he does so, Esca’s hands settle on his arse, urging his hips to move against him. And it dawns on Marcus that Esca doesn’t want to be made love to. Not yet, at least. He was expecting Marcus to put up a fight, to resist, not knowing that Marcus has been helpless against him for weeks, if not months.

He pulls back to look at Esca panting beneath him, eyes glassy with want. “You’re beautiful,” he doesn’t say. Instead, he forces himself to frown slightly and grind out, “Turn over,” in the best approximation of his command voice that he can muster under extreme arousal.

Esca nearly elbows Marcus in the face in his eagerness to comply, his wiry limbs twisting beneath him easily. Like an eel, Marcus thinks fondly as he pushes himself up and runs an appreciative hand down the line of Esca’s spine. An extremely arousing eel.

“Shall I have you like this?” he breathes in Esca’s ear, slotting his cock in the crease of his ass, covering his hands with his own, and pressing his weight along Esca’s back.

The hitch in Esca’s breathing is answer enough, but Marcus wants to watch him move, to touch him as much as he can.

“No, I think not. Elbows and knees.”

He pushes back to allow Esca room to comply and then molds himself to Esca’s back, burying his face in his neck and wrapping an arm around his chest to place a hand at his throat. Not squeezing, but threat enough to wrest some of Esca’s control away, as Marcus suspects he wants. Marcus can feel as Esca swallows, the fluttering of his pulse, and it sends a thrill through him to be so close.

Esca wants him to be a Roman, so Marcus will have him as a proper Roman would. Later there’ll be time for leisurely exploration, but now there’s a water clock downstairs wiling away their time in this room. With his free hand, Marcus guides his cock between Esca’s thighs, trusting that he’s plenty slick, and nudges Esca’s legs together with his knees.

A small, displeased sound escapes Esca’s throat, but Marcus hushes him by pressing his lips to his neck and wrapping his free hand around his dripping cock. He moves his hips then, nudging against Esca’s balls and pressing him further into the circle of his fist. He does it again and Esca arches his back, pressing it up against Marcus’ chest, happily taking some of his weight.

Marcus sets a hard rhythm between his hips and his hand, and he can feel as Esca becomes taut as a bowstring, quivering with the stimulation. He wants badly to see Esca’s face, but he settles for the smell of his sweat and the sound of his harsh breathing as he thrusts between his thighs, painting them with his fluids. The combination brings him embarrassingly close to the brink, but he holds off, squeezing his fist tighter and sinking his teeth into the meat of Esca’s shoulder.

Esca lets loose a string of guttural syllables as he stiffens, his hips twitching as he climaxes, and Marcus slows his thrusts to savor what little of it he can. When Esca finally allows his forehead to drop to the sheet as he breathes heavily, Marcus releases him to stroke shaky fingers over his hip and press gentling kisses to the mark left behind by his teeth. The desire to drive towards his own orgasm is overwhelming, but he waits as Esca recovers.

That’s why he’s surprised when he feels long fingers stroke along his cock and back to his balls as Esca spreads his legs. They squeeze his sac roughly, prying a loud grunt from him, before wrapping around his cock and stroking purposefully despite the awkwardness of the angle.

Esca has dropped his shoulder to the bed so he can reach between his own legs, his head turned to the side and his cheek pressed to the mattress. Marcus buries his face in Esca’s hair, nose pressing behind his ear, and comes, gasping Esca’s name.

Flopping to his side almost immediately, Marcus catches his breath and tries to straighten his bad leg to ease some of the pain when his senses fully return. There’s no question whether he’s overtaxed it, though he could think of worse ways to do so.

He opens his eyes to Esca’s, looking at him almost curiously, though it’s difficult to tell with his mouth hidden by his upper arm because he’s moved to stretch out on his stomach, his head pillowed on his hands. Marcus reaches up to drag a pillow beneath his own head, tucking his arm beneath it.

They watch each other silently for several moments, comfortable in their separate spaces.

It takes Marcus running the knuckle of his forefinger down Esca’s arm in the barest of caresses to break the strange tension, allowing Esca to close his eyes. Marcus takes that as invitation to run his fingertips down Esca’s back, through the cooling sweat, but still with as cautious a touch as he can manage.

“I did ask you to touch me,” Esca says, muffled by the skin of his arm. Marcus flattens his hand and strokes firmly over the same path.

“I wasn’t sure if you meant that as an open invitation or a demand.” He pauses at the small of Esca’s back, drawing his fingers over the dimples there.

“Both,” and there’s amusement in it.

“Hm,” Marcus chuckles. “You’re inscrutable, do you know that?”

Esca opens his eyes, giving him that look that feels as though he’s trying to bore his way into the core of him to mine whatever he can find there and bring it up to inspect in the light.

“They say you learn quickly.”

And Marcus must, because he laughs and, in answer, Esca rolls onto his side and rewards him with a kiss. This time, there’s only the barest hint of teeth.


End file.
